By Awad Rajoub
RAMALLAH (AA): Israeli settlers set fire to hundreds of olive trees belonging to Palestinian farmers in the occupied West Bank, a local activist said Sunday.
Fouad Al-Amor, a member of the Committee for the Protection of Palestinian Villages, an NGO, said the settlers threw “suspicious objects” onto land near the Khallet Ad-Dabi’ area to the east of Hebron’s Yatta town which caused a fire to break out. The settlers came from the nearby illegal Mitzpe Yair settlement.
“Nearly 400 olive trees were burnt and damaged, including around 250 trees over 15 years old,” he told Anadolu Agency.
It was estimated that 400 olive trees were burnt before the Palestinian Civil Defense was able to extinguish the fire, preventing damage to homes.
Al-Amor went on to note that the settlers attacked a Palestinian home and destroyed a water supply network in the same area.
In July 31, 2015 in Douma village near Nablus, Ali Saad Dawabsha, 18 months old, was burned to death when Israeli settlers torched his family’s home. The child’s mother, father, and four-year-old brother, were all severely burned, his parents later died from complications related to their wounds.
Israeli and Palestinian estimates indicate that there are about 650,000 settlers illegally living in 164 settlements constructed in the West Bank and East Jerusalem.
*Writing by Ali Abo Rezeg
Additional report from imemc.org
[Archive Photo: Israeli settlers confront Palestinian youth against settlements in Hebron on 10 February 2019. Photographer: Mamoun Wazwaz/AA]